Mapping Explanations of Academic Variability and Racial/Ethnic Identification

For the last forty years researchers have posited competing theories regarding the relative influence of social class background and racialgroup membership on the school experiences, academic performance, behavior, and motivation of ethnic minority students. The general purpose of these competing theories has been to explain why ethnic minority students fail or succeed in schools. Many of these theories consider factors inside the school, and the child’s family, culture, racial/ ethnic group affiliation, and responses to school. These theories are commonly situated into three categories of thought: cultural deprivation, cultural difference/discontinuity, and cultural ecology.